The Kevin Sheehan Show - NBA, NIL, & Czabe

Episode Date: July 7, 2021

Kevin with two guests on the show today after opening with a recap of the Suns' Game 1 NBA Finals win over Milwaukee. At 10:45, Steve Czaban joined Kevin to discuss the made-for-tv golf match between DeChambeau/Rodgers and Mickelson/Brady. They talked some Washington Football too. Kevin also had Dan Murphy/ESPN on the show at 48:40 to examine Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) in college sports. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

You don't want it. You don't need it. But you're going to get it anyway. The Kevin Cheyenne Show. Here's Kevin. Two guests on the show today. Steve Zabin will be on the show. I called Zabe because I want to talk about the golf.

The match last night from Big Sky in Montana featuring Tom Brady Phil Mickelson as a team versus Bryson DeShambot and Aaron Rogers. I watched a lot of it. I am sure that Zabe watched. a lot of it as well. I'm sure we'll talk some Washington football with Zabe when he's on. We will get to him shortly. Right after Zab, Dan Murphy from ESPN will be a guest on the show. Dan has written extensively about name, image, and likeness. There are a lot of moving pieces to this one.

So we will get Dan to try to explain some of it. There was a story that I read that Dan wrote late last night about a Miami business, a South Florida business. It's a mixed martial arts business where the owner of that business is going to invest $500 a month in 90 Miami football players. So basically about a half million dollar plus investment into the Miami football program to have those 90 players advertise his business. It's getting critical. already in the first week of this. So Dan Murphy from ESPN will join us after Zabe does. I want to mention that if you haven't subscribed to the show, please do so. It does not cost you a thing. Also, if you haven't rated or reviewed the show on Apple and or Spotify, if you could do that for us,

that would be a big help as well. It'll take you 30 seconds to give us five stars as a rating and to write up a one-sentence review that you really like the show. All of that helps us on the advertising front. I want to start with the NBA Finals game one. I'm not going to spend a lot of time on it at all, but I just wanted to mention that, you know, it's a weird NBA finals, right? Milwaukee versus Phoenix.

Tommy and I talked about that the other day. It is a game in game one where Janice Sotenticompo did play, even though he was doubtful going into the game, he played. I thought he played well. I thought he looked totally healthy for the most part. Still an issue at the free throw line like he always is. 20.17 rebounds. I thought he really looked ready. And when it was announced that he was going to be in the lineup, the point spread dropped from Phoenix minus six to Phoenix minus four. I even saw some three and a halves out there. And I ended up liking Milwaukee. Even though I picked Phoenix to win this series.

in five games. I ended up betting Milwaukee last night plus the points. That did not work out. Phoenix is just better. I'd be shocked if Phoenix doesn't win this series, especially after seeing one game in this series. Now, there are always adjustments between games one and two, or

games two and three. The team that loses has to make the adjustments or they just have to play better. In this particular case, though, Milwaukee's got to make a big adjustment. And I've talked about this before, you know, Boudinholzer, the coach of the Bucks, I think that they are at a massive disadvantage in

this series, Milwaukee, the Bucks are, because I think Monty Williams is just a much better coach. But Phoenix ran a lot of ISO last night and a shitload of pick and roll. And with Chris Paul in the pick and roll, or even Devin Booker in the pick and roll, it's very hard to guard. Either one of them, you know, in ISO situations, really difficult to guard. But the way Milwaukee was doing it was not the right answer. First of all, let me just say that Chris Paul has just been sensational. He was again last night, 32 points, nine assists, one turnover in the game. 12 of 19 from the floor. Chris Paul's last two games in the postseason, the closeout game against the Clippers last week and game won last night. 73 points on 28 of 43 from the floor. He's shooting 65%. He's

11 of 15 from behind the arc, and he's got 17 assists, and he's got one turnover in the last two games. 36-year-old Chris Paul is playing the best basketball of his life, and it's really, really fun to watch. Whether he's in an ISO situation at the end of a shot clock, or whether he's in a pick-and-roll situation, or leading a fast break. He's truly one of the smartest, highest IQ players in the history of the game. game, and we're seeing it all come together at 36 years old. He wasn't healthy when the

playoffs started. He missed the first two games against the Clippers in the conference finals because of COVID, but my God, has he been great in these playoffs? I don't see how the combination of Paul, Booker, Aiton, Bridges, Crowder, et cetera, can be stopped. Cam Johnson, ridiculous shooter off the bench. Aiton last night in his first ever championship series game, points 19 rebounds. He had a game a few weeks ago in the conference finals or two weeks ago 19 points 22 rebounds. In his last two games, DeAndre Aiton, the number one number one overall from the 2018 draft out of Arizona. And a lot of people skeptical at various times during his first couple of years as to whether or not it was going to work out. In his last two games,

he's 16 of 20 from the floor. Eight of 10, eight of 10. That's 80 percent for those of you that struggle with that. He's also got 17 rebounds in the last game he played 19 last night. He's been phenomenal. He is shooting into the 60s percentage-wise, high 60s percentage-wise, from the floor in the postseason. He has great hands, he's got great feet, he's got great poise. Chris Paul makes it all go. And here is what Milwaukee has to figure out. Milwaukee against the Nets switched too many screens allowing Brooke Lopez to guard Kevin Durant. Remember that game five when Durant went off and Brooke Lopez was on him too much? They do play, the Bucks do play Bobby Portis. Remember when he was here? I was a big Bobby Portis fan. A Portis has really turned

into a really good player. He's had some really good games. It's tough for him switching on to Chris Paul or Devin Booker. I'm going to offer up like a very test, solution, but there really aren't many solutions to stopping Phoenix's pick and roll right now. But one of the things you cannot do is switch every single screen. They have to stop doing that. Brooke Lopez trying to guard Chris Paul is, it's awkward and embarrassing. And the coach that puts him into that position and thinks it's okay is out of his mind. I think the same thing about Bobby Portis. I wouldn't switch even with Portis, even though he's longer and he's more athletic. It's still a mismatch. Last night, they were switching every screen. So what are the solutions to a guy

that in pick and roll has a big guy and has shooters surrounding the floor like Booker and bridges, etc? By the way, this goes for Booker in the pick and roll too. Well, you either have to hedge hard and run them out to half court best you can and then recover and then go from there. Or you have to double that player and make them give up the ball. Neither solution is very good against Phoenix. Trust me, I'm not telling you that Milwaukee's got a lot that they can go to defensively here. Phoenix is very difficult to guard. They really are.

They're a very intriguing team right now because they're really good, and yet they came out of nowhere, and they don't have players that have massive brands. But trust me, they are really good and so hard to guard. And Aitin and Booker are all, are both future stars. And I think Booker could be a future top five player. I don't think you can let Chris Paul come off that pick and roll and make decisions with the ball in his hands.

I think you've got to make him give it up. and then you've got a hope that they miss or that you can recover and you can rotate and you can defend and then grab a rebound as you're rotating. I don't, but here's what 100% is not the right thing to do. You cannot switch every single ball screen

and end up with the mismatches that Milwaukee had all last night. That's got to change. Phoenix is really fun to watch. They are really fun to watch. It's a good team with good players and a good coach. All right, Steve Zabin will join us next, right after these words from a few of our sponsors. I watched a lot of the golf yesterday on TNT, the match between the team of Phil Mickelson and Tom Brady against Aaron Rogers and Bryson D. Shambot.

First of all, the setting in Big Sky, Montana, the course was spectacular. But I really enjoyed it. I watched a lot of it, and it was on for a long period of time. I think the entire match lasted more than five hours. There's one person more than any other, or certainly as much as any other in my life, that I'm pretty sure watched this, and that is Steve Zaven, who joins us right now. And I just wanted to know, what did you think of it? I love it for a number of reasons.

number one is that, hey, it's summer. What else are we going to watch? Although the NBA finals were on, I did watch that as well. But I'm a fan of exhibitions. I'm a fan of things that used to be a staple in sports. I mean, the home run derby, the one versus one special series, you remember that. There used to be one-on-one games at halftime of NBA playoff games. Paul Westfall and John Ablach.

Exactly. There was horse games as well. Remember the horse. I'm a fan of exhibitions, number one. Number two, as a lover of golf, anything that brings my sport shine and credibility is a good thing. And undeniably, having two of the greatest alpha athletes in the number one sport in this country, tackle football, professional style, playing golf, and interacting with two PGA tour stars is great for the game of golf. it says, hey, this is a great sport, not leisure activity for middle-aged men. It's a sport that's hard.

And you can see how hard it is because here's two of the best to ever play the hardest sport in the world, the hardest position of quarterback, and they suck compared to the pros. Although Brady played, or Rogers played well yesterday with everything considered. So that's good as well. There can be refinements, though. I mean, it's got to move faster. Oh, my God. plus hours. Number one, that's got to move faster. Number two, write a huge check to charity at the

start of the broadcast list every boys and girls club who's going to get the money and every corporation who donated. And then, Kevin, we're done with it. Every bunker shot doesn't have to be brought to you by so-and-so. Okay, that's suggestion number two. But the possibilities are endless with other athletes and other sports, teaming up with tour pros, with the technology and being miced up and the constant chitter-chatter. It's a great concept. I mean, I demand Steph Curry and somebody else in the next iteration. I demand it. Well, we got Steph Curry, remember in one of the ones previously, which I didn't watch. By the way, I, um... We did? I must have missed that one. Yeah, Curry, um, Curry played.

with Barkley, remember? Oh, right. Yeah. You know, I'm kind of lost my way on this. But look, there's other players as well. You know, we haven't tapped into retired baseball players. I saw Dantrell Willis tweeted, hey, man, how about get some retired, you know, baseball players in on this thing.

The possibilities are there. It's a wonderful, easy, light viewing, visually spectacular. Holy cow. It was yesterday. The State of Montana's tourism board, home run. with that feature last night. It was great to watch, but, I mean, I'm struck

by Brady and Rogers. I mean, these guys at the pinnacle of our sports ecosystem. And they're such different dudes. And I was telling my boys in Milwaukee this morning, I said, you know what? I'm a Roger stand to the very end,

and I want him back like nobody's business. And I will defend his right to be annoyed by what they did drafting George's. and love. But you know what? He came off as diminished standing next to Brady. I saw it last night. Ooh. He came off as, yes, he came off as less alpha. Nobody Kevin is inspired by, well, we'll see what happens in a couple weeks. Well, who knows about the opener. Oh, okay. You're talking about that. Yes, enough of the aggrieved act. You know, Brady is like, look, this is what I'm doing. I'm playing football because I know I still can. I love doing it. I don't care if my wife is worried for me. I don't

care if the Patriots say they think I'm done. I'm still playing. That's alpha. What Rogers has done is he's like a cat who got stuck in a tree. And it's going to take the fire department now to get him down. But I know he's going to play football this year. I have no doubt in my mind. So, okay, a couple of things. Number one, I think it's hysterical. because during all of the, you know, there's another $25,000 for this charity when they hit it in the trap. I said to my wife who was in the room, I said, this has to stop. And it reminded me, as you were describing it, I sat in a meeting many years ago for one of the kids' schools and they're talking about an auction. And I said, why don't we just get everybody to cough up, you know, 300, 400,000 bucks and have a really nice dinner, you know, and call it a night.

But you know, but you had to go through all of the things and signing up all the things and getting all the items for the auction. I mean, it's just incredibly laborious. And I think anybody would rather not go through all that and just write a check. Whatever. I'm totally with you on that. So the golf was beautiful. The setting spectacular in Big Sky, Montana. All of that was true.

So one of the things I discussed on my radio show this morning is, who did you like the most? And for me, it wasn't even close. I loved Aaron Rogers. Even more. Yes. And let me tell you why. First of all, by the way, when diminished next to Brady, actually a lot of people were saying, you know, Brady came dressed appropriately and all the other three were scrubs with shorts on in a cold weather environment. Whatever.

That didn't bother me. I also, by the way, okay, so the other thing, physically, one of the things, and I don't know if you were at Richmond the year the Patriots were there and Brady held court after once. So I was down there for that. And one of the things that I'll never forget is how unbelievably big of a human being Brady is. Yeah, he's a cool. He's a big dude. And Rogers is not. And there were times when they were standing next to each other talking on a green, and you could see Brady, he towers over Rogers.

But here's why I loved Rogers. First of all, you know, over the last couple of months, and you know this much more than I, because Zabe, I think most of you know, he hosts a show, a morning radio show in Milwaukee. He doesn't live in Milwaukee. He lives here, but he hosts his show. He's been doing stuff in Milwaukee for decades, and he hosts a morning show there. I wish he were still hosting an afternoon drive show here, but that's another subject. But the thing about Rogers is that, you know, we hear, you know, he's difficult. And the Mark Murphy statements, which, by the way, have been moronic, in my opinion, over the last couple of months.

And how, you know, he's aloof and he's the smartest guy in the room, whatever. You probably have all of those descriptions. But what I learned about Rogers in five, in this long format is, A, he's very bright. He's very quick, witted, and biting, sarcastically biting, which I kind of like. But my favorite part of the night was when they conceded, when Mickelson and Brady conceded a put to Deschambe, Zabe, it might have been on 12 or 13. But Phil wanted the whole explanation of how Bryson would dissect the putt. So he went through all this stuff and the angles and the percentages and the, you know,

the stimp meter rating and everything. And then, you know, Phil says, so what? And he says, about 10 inches, 12 inches, and he puts the, you know, T down. And you see Rogers, he walks by Brady and he says something to Brady, which makes Brady laugh. And then after the whole thing, by the way, Deschambeau sinks the putt, they have Rogers in the cart driving back. And he says, and I'm paraphrasing here. First of all, he makes, they say, well, what did you think of the whole Bryson Deschambeau display there? And he takes his finger and, you know, does the circular emotion like he's crazy, you know, around his head. And then he says, he says, you know, it just seems like a lot of information. He goes, I've kidded many coaches about trying to make things over

complicated. And I've always said to them, just because you make it overcomplicated or seem that way doesn't make you increasingly more intelligent. And he then, you know, and he's sort of really in a very subtle way went after DeCambeau, and then he said, he said, but shit, you know, whatever. He made the putt. You know, it's obviously working for him, but he said, it just seems like a little bit too much

for me. And that's, by the way, the way I feel about the whole DeCambeau thing, and I think you know this. I think a lot of golfers feel the same way about DeCambeau. Like, he's not the favorite of a lot of these people out there. No, no. In fact, somebody said that DeCambeau and Rogers were a good fit,

because they're both guys who consider themselves the smartest guys in the room. But Rogers is bright, Zay. So sort of a cool guy. I, well, okay, do you think, do you think DeCambeau is kind of fraudulent? No, you know, no, I, let me just say this. Rogers has a sense of humor. DeCambeau doesn't. I would agree with you on that.

But here's, like, DeChambo is this whole topic under itself. Like, the whole DeCambeau thing could spend hours. Sure. breaking them down tearing him apart um rogers i still adore rogers i love him i understand what he's going through he is making sure that the packers fucking geniuses can i say fucking on this podcast he is making sure that the brain trust of replaceable suits murphy and goodacunct he is making sure they know in no uncertain terms how badly they fucked up by drafting a quarterback thinking Rogers was about at the end of his useful life cycle. He is making him

twist in it, soak in it, bays in it, and it's very vindictive of Rogers. I get it. Although it doesn't help my desire for him to come to camp on time, get right with his new rookie receiver to add to the mix, and win a goddamn Super Bowl this year. That's all I care about. I'm almost like, that's enough, Rogers. Rogers, he's made your point. That's enough. Okay. stop hitting them, but that's what he's doing, because he was right. He packed it up their asses with an MVP trophy. It's rare to have that in sports where the player goes, oh, you think I suck, huh? And so that's what's going on.

And Rogers has that vindictive streak, but I think he's going to come back and play. I think he just has to figure out a way to hang a mission accomplished banner and declare victory before he reports in three weeks. I think I agree with you. I think there comes a point where like enough is enough because they're not going to move you. And you want to play football and you've made your point. I also think that the Packers continue to misstep with this. And there hasn't clearly been some sort of public, correct me if I'm wrong, like, hey, we really fuck this up.

I mean... No, no. In fact, when Murphy made his unhaping, helpful comments about how, you know, the previous GM Ted Thompson called Rogers a, quote, complicated fellow. Right. I tweeted, oh, I'm sorry, I think you misspoke. What you meant to say is Aaron Rogers is a generational talent and our unquestioned leader.

We have to get it right with him. And I will spend no amount of time making sure that it is right so we can pursue a Super Bowl, period, end of statement. That's what they should say. But they don't say that. And so if everyone got injected with truth serum, then Rogers could come out and say, you know what? I really wish they had taken a wide receiver with that first round pick last year because I'm better than love now. I'll be better than love next year. He's a nice kid. He's

wasting his career sitting behind me, and I don't really want to play for anybody else. But here we are. It's too much truth, though, for anyone to handle. God, it's so true. And when Murphy, you know, by the way, Murphy made that statement, like a week after he said, I'm not going to discuss this. publicly anymore. And I just, I was like, what are you doing? Why would you do this? You know, it's like the same feeling I have about, I think, your other favorite team, because I was about to refer to you as Mr. Milwaukee, as you said, you wanted the Packers to win a Super Bowl. But our other favorite team, your other favorite team, who, like, sometimes I'm just like, Jesus, can anybody shake this asshole and just say, do.

It's you. Dan, it's your fault. I know. Just apologize and tell everybody you've learned from it and that you're going to try to be better. And he can never do it because there is, I guess, with competitive athletes, professional athletes, which Mark Murphy was, there is this, you know,

it's not my fault. It's not our fault. And I'm not going to lose this battle. But that's totally how they should handle it. And then we could really call Rogers an asshole if he then didn't say, okay, I accept your apology. But you've got to be able to... I know. You're right.

You're right. But when you wake up with a 10-figure bank account, it means never having to say you were r-ro-wrote wrong. Yeah. Well, you were sorry. And that's where Snyder is. I mean, when I saw Snyder in a statement saying, I learned how my operation. worked over the last couple of months, I damn near choked on a chicken bone. I'm like, what?

20 years in, and you're saying you just learned these last six months how your organization operates, fuck you to the moon on that statement. Get out of here with that nonsense. And oh, by the way, I need to get more involved. Like, what? Right. Rather than the prescription is more of me. It's like, we need more Cal Bell, the great S&L skit, with Will Ferrell.

What's the prescription? More me. More cowbell. No, it's been too much you is what it's been. It's really yelling. No, well, it's remarkable to me time and time again for, you know, certainly the last 10 years, how I've never seen an organization read the room more inaccurately than he does and their PR people on almost every front. To suggest that it's a good idea to tell everybody that you weren't involved and none of it's your fault and really what you have to to do is get back involved and that that would be well received is just incredible. It's amazing. It's amazing. By the way, you know, you're wrong. You know where that came from? Fonzie. And where did Fonsie live? Milwaukee, yes. There you go. Boy, this has got a Milwaukee theme to it. It's got a Milwaukee theme to it. It's got a Milwaukee theme to it.

Kevin, Kevin, real quick, real quick, because I know you love basketball. I know you're watching these fun. Yes. I've got to tell you that being up there in Milwaukee for several games down to the Deer District

and I went to Fycer for one of the games up there, I was so caught up in how great a ride it is. All I could think about was us here in D.C. and with the Wizards, perennially the Clippers East, without even the Clippers' recent success. And all I can think about is how insanely fun it would be if Ted ever assembled a team that could contend for a championship. It would be bonkers fun in D.C. because basketball is such a huge deal here, and it's such a sport that's more accessible to the casual fan than hockey.

I totally agree. I mean, forever. And, you know, I wonder if I'm even right on this anymore. But, you know, this is, at its core, and I've always felt this way, and in part because I've been a part of it in so many different ways, this is a basketball city. You know, more people are involved in basketball at every level, whether it's as a parent or as a coach or a referee or as a participant than any other sport. We have the greatest, you know, we've got the best high school and some of the best youth basketball talent in the country. There are more player, there are 14 players from Prince George's County, you know, in the water, the Kevin Durant thing. I mean, it goes on and on, But it's really, you know, remember a couple of years ago when they were very close to getting to the Eastern Conference finals, you know, it took literally a seventh and deciding game against the Celtics to get a massive TV rating, which it did.

But I agree with you. If they ever became a legitimate year-in, year-out June championship contender, it would be easily the number two in this town. and number three would be distant. Yeah, because what you have to feel and you have to be there up close, you have to understand how the fan base and the city loves the players on this team. And they love how they have come together, and they love how every guy on the box has a little something that they do, you know, a little specialty that's their deal,

in addition to the stars being the stars, and you fall in love with a team like that. You know, the Caps run and the red tide that filled the streets of D.C. That was great. And I know that Caps Nation and Caps honk, that's our former PD once called the Hardcore guys. Caps honk, they knew and loved their favorite hockey players, but they weren't as vibrant in who they were and what they did, and you couldn't understand it as well, because hockey is so subtle and nuanced.

But in basketball, you know it's like Bobby Porta, former wizard. He's this total energy guy that is just relentlessly positive. He comes in off the bench and he makes things happen. They love him up there. He's a cult figure. Conitin, the springy white guy, you know, who comes in to just shoot threes. And it's like, well, he's going to miss some, but he's also going to get hot from time to time. This town would fall in love with all the peripheral players on a wizard's team that was a bona fide legitimate contender,

not a team that's kind of trying to get it together. And, hey, at least they're irrelevant this year. and looks like they can make a ham sandwich out of Westbrook and Beal for a couple of years, but I still think they're ways away from building a full-on. They are. What do people think of Budenholzer, who, for whatever reason, once again, was taking, you know, in the pick and roll his center, Brooke Lopez, and switching them on to people he shouldn't be guarding?

He drives me crazy. What do people up there think of him? Well, but is frequently mocked, but you know what? It's like, well, he's our guy, for now. Asterisk. I say that Coach Bud looks perennially like the business traveler who just saw the last shuttle bus from remote parking leave without him. That's his perennial look. He's like, hey, hey, wait a minute, you know. He never looks confident. He never looks in control. And yes, his coaching is very questionable. But he's a two-time, Kevin, coach of the year in the NBA.

So what does that say to you? I think the problem with what they're dealing with Phoenix is they don't have any great options. They've got three ways to defend the pick and roll, and none of them are working right now. And certainly using Lopez to try to guard guys on switches, that don't work either. No, it's hard. Like I talked about it at the beginning of this show, it's hard. It's easy to say, well, don't switch. Well, they shouldn't be.

That's the first answer. But it's not necessarily a solution either. They're so good in the pick and roll. Paul's such a great decision maker. They've got a big that can roll and catch, and they've got shooters everywhere. You know, I had a bigger issue when they were switching Lopez on to Durant in game five, I think it was over and over again, when truly the Nets didn't have the same number of options on the floor because of all of the injuries.

I thought that was insane that night. But it's, yeah. Yeah, I think you're right about that. Like this morning, my tone on my show, and I told the guys this, I said, look, I'm not in despair. They got handled pretty good last night. I'm just a bit shook. And they're like, really? And I go, yeah, I said, I'm a bit shook because when I look at this Sun's team when they're on, they're really goddamn good.

Like, they got everything you need. And I feel there's a worry for me that they are a breakaway train right now because they've got such confidence. they've got speed and athleticism. CP3 is playing the basketball as a life. Booker might be my favorite player in the league other than anybody on a team I'm rooting for. And they got all these other pieces.

I mean, hell, Cameron Payne looks like the fastest MF are out there. I'm like, dude, is that even legal? How quick that guy is? So they are really good, and I think the Bucks have a lot on their plate, and it was amazing that Yonis played. He's got, you know, tendons that are made out of

nuclear rubber. I thought he played well. I thought he really looked right early, especially. The free throw thing is a huge liability. It's hard to run it through them all that time. So I don't want the sun getting any more confidence because they look awfully hard to beat. Yeah, it's just such an odd finals that, like forever I have always felt,

and you have to go back to 2004 to find an example that would refute this, that if you don't have an obvious top five player on your team, you can't win an NBA title. And the last team not to have an obvious top five player on the roster to win a title were the 2004 Pistons who beat the Lakers, and Chauncey Billups basically was their best player. He was not a top five player. And I look at this series, and to me, Janice definitely can be talked about as a top five player. But Phoenix doesn't necessarily have a top five player, although Booker and or Aiton could be in the future. but my God, their point guard at 36 years old is not only playing unbelievable basketball,

it's some of the highest IQ basketball. You'll see his assist to turnover ratio is ridiculous. Yeah. Well, you're a good point. I mean, first of all, it's the first, like, off-brand, the finals. Yeah, for sure. Oh, 5. And we've had LeBron, Steph, or Kobe for 15 straight years in the finals, if not both of those guys.

So there's that. But also, remember how quickly, like all of a sudden the warriors caught fire? Yes. Sort of like a gas tank that went up. You think this is Phoenix? Well, I don't know, but I just went back and I looked at, you know, Golden State. There were a 51-47 win team. And then the conflagration of Steph with Clay, the three-point revolution, with, what, what's his name, Draymond, doing all the little dirty things with Igadala as a reliable

secondary wing, it went up in flames. It was like, boom. They were suddenly this amazing team. Could Phoenix be on the verge of that, possibly? The thing is, is that their best, I don't want to say he's the best player, because I think actually Devin Booker is their best player moving forward. But God. You're saying the best player is a 16-year veteran in Christmall.

Yeah, I mean, right now, what's making it all come together is this 36-year-old. So how much longer do you have? Well, you know, he's been hurt. And the thing about Golden State, too, it was transformational basketball. We hadn't seen anything like what the barrage and the length of the three-point shot was. And, you know, that first year. And the fact that the world was still sleeping on Clay Thompson a little bit. And, you know, that first year, they got a break because they were about to go down one-nothing to San Antonio,

who were the defending champions, and Kauai Leonard ended up on what's his face's ankle. Jaya, Petulia's ankle. And, you know, I think San Antonio probably would have beaten Golden State in that series had Kauai not gotten hurt. Um, that's, you know, I know you're, I mean, obviously you're so into this because you're hosting a show there as well. And you put it in sort of, uh, you know, it would be great to have that here too. But I also think and correct me if I'm wrong. This is so much more possible in a place, not that it wouldn't happen here, but the big crowds that we're seeing in, what do they call that deer park or whatever? The deer district.

It's a big lot outside the building, and they've got a number of supporting bars and restaurants around it. It's a Midwest thing in so many ways. It is. It is, and they get, you know, they're a bit of front-running fans, but they get behind their team. The same thing would happen here, even though there's no restaurants to then, you know, hang out in around Capital One Arena. I think what we saw with the Capitals would be replicated with the Whittal. Yeah, I agree. I think there's a yearning.

I mean, people as fans, and especially young people, they want to be out amongst other people being together for something, even a silly basketball team or a hockey team that they only kind of got on board with recently. Right. The young generation is so goddamn disconnected, thanks to their phones and shit, that when there's an opportunity to come together, I mean, it blew me away seeing just how young the crowd was at the Deer District, where they're literally standing for three hours with expensive beers as they're

only libation to watch on a jumbo-tron outside. They did it, and they keep doing it. We are past that point. We're trying to get 18 in the afternoon in and then find a place to watch with like a group of 10 of us, maybe.

With comfortable chairs and more clear liquid. Well, we watch when we were there, when we were there, we were just outside of that big square of people at this sport bar called the Mecca. We had a table. We had wings.

And yes, we were sitting down most of the time, and that was just fine for us. That's funny. All right. How are you doing? Excellent. Thank you for calling. Looking forward to football season.

Me too. Let's go have a season. Let's go have a season, Kevin. Come on. You know, they have a good team. I said this this morning, and I didn't really mean to say it, but somebody, I think it was a caller,

said that's a really good way to put it, which it wasn't, you know, anything revelation-wise. But I just said- Normal Wednesday, but I just said, you know, it's a good all-around roster. It's a pretty complete roster. It's not elite, but it's as complete a roster as they've had in years. It's true. They've always had obvious, obvious holes, obvious. needs. And we still don't know about the quarterback situation, but the rest of the teams surrounding the quarterback is pretty complete. And by the way, there's depth in some of those spots. But whatever,

it's the NFL. It's impossible to predict. Here's my ultimate question to you. As I exit this wonderful conversation, which will continue at a future date, is 9 and 8 a good season? quote unquote it will be disappointing for most but considering if they end up playing the schedule that it appears they could play it would be a good season and an improved season by two games

with an extra game to create that but remember they were seven and nine last year and the seven teams they beat all had like third string quarterbacks for the most part except for Rafflesberger No, you're right, you're right, but then the counter argument is we were trying to handhold a child at quarterback in Dwayne Haskins for the first half of the year. Yeah. So that was a huge handicap.

The big question is ultimately, I don't care about anything else, how good the defense is, new weapons on offense. Can Ryan Fitzpatrick win 11 out of 16 games? If he can, good for him. I will believe it when I see it. We were holding Dwayne Haskins' hand, and we were trying to. to keep another quarterback basically together with string for most of the year. We played four quarterbacks last year. But so did the rest of the division for the most part.

Everybody in the division last year played at least two quarterbacks. I think the division's going to be better this year. And I think it'll be more competitive. Well, it can't be worse. It's going to be better. It can't be worse. Well, I guess the only question is, are the Eagles going to suck as bad as it looks like they're going to suck?

I don't. Because even Eagle fans are saying, oh, my God, we are going to suck. I did one of these completely worthless exercises a few weeks ago, but I just had free time and I was curious and I thought I might find something similar to what I found. So you know that there hasn't been a repeat NFC East champion since 2003, 2004 with the Eagles going back to back with McNabb, Reed, et cetera, right? Every, so there hasn't been a repeat winner since. But it's much more than that. In the 16 years since, nine times, and I went back and I went back and I found the preseason odds for the division before each one of the last 16 years since the last repeat champion.

Nine times out of 16, the team picked to finish last won the division. Seven, five times the team picked to finish third won the division. One time the team picked to finish second, won the division. And only once did a team that was predictable. to win the division, win the division. So it's just this division, you know, there's no real, you know, substantive information. Are we the consensus pick to win the division? No, Dallas is.

Dallas is the favorite. We're the consensus second pick, though. I think the Giants are, I think they've got a really good roster. And they were very close last year in a lot of games that could have, put them in as, you know, an 8-and-8 division champion instead of Washington. Remember, they swept Washington. Washington hasn't beaten, the skins haven't beaten the Giants in like three years. So I think they're the team that could be better than people think. You know, I'm a believer in Dak Prescott now, but there is no cure for an ass defense,

and Dallas has an ass defense, and it is not going to get better, not this year. They have a really good defensive coordinator and Dan Quinn replacing Mike Nolan, and their talent is, I always felt it was much better than their results. But, yeah, they were terrible defensively, and they also played like we did, three or four quarterbacks during the course of the year. I think Gail Gilbert played the game. Gooding Ben Danucci. Danucci, Gayle Gilbert, Andy Dalton, and Dak Prescott.

They played four, we played four. The Eagles played three. and the Giants played two, including Colt McCoy. All right. Hey, real quick, I'm going to hang up on you on this point regarding coordinators. You know who's the coordinator now on defense in Green Bay, right? Former Redskinned guy, Joe Barry. Oh, is Joe Barry the coordinator for LaFleur?

Yes. Oh, my God. They love him. But he was just working with Sean. I know. He's part of the Sean LaFleur. buddy system. And even though the old coordinator, whose name already forgotten, who was unimpressive in my mind and many others, they finally fired him. I'm like, all right, great. And

then they end up hiring Joe Barry. And I bit my tongue in half on the radio because I didn't want to be such a negative nelly. But were you? I just felt like, yeah, I'm like, this guy's not good. I'm like his, Owen, you know, his record, go look it up. It's for a reason. Nice guy. knows the right people. He's not good. They're going to have to win despite him. So we'll see. There's the retread, you know, thing. I mean, my God, you know, knowing people and being probably a good guy goes a long way. But he's had no success, I don't think. Goes forever in coaching circle. That's what it does. Lifeers. All right, I'll talk to you. Thanks, Abe. Appreciate it.

Up next, name, image, and likeness. Everything that you need to know about it, I think, with Dan Murphy from ESPN, right after a few words from a few of our sponsors. All right, I want to welcome in Dan Murphy to the show. Dan writes for ESPN, and he's been covering this whole NIL, name image, likeness thing since the beginning. And he's written some really good stories over the last couple of weeks that really explain everything. but we're going to have him do it right here on the podcast. Dan, I reached out to you because I was reading the story that you wrote, I guess, late yesterday about this Florida-based mixed martial arts gym business that essentially is going to make a huge investment in Miami football, Miami Hurricane football, spending, you know, between a half million and $600,000 a year or a season on players. I do want to get in into some of the detail of how this is working and how this will sort of manifest itself. I know people have sort of been, you know, they've been reading a little bit about it,

and I think it's not an easy thing for everybody to understand. But real quickly on this story that you wrote, is this the largest deal so far since this became, you know, a legal thing in most states? Hey, Kevin, yeah, thanks for having me. And I think as far as we know, it's the largest reported deal. There are plenty of athletes that have signed deals that haven't made public exactly how much money they're making or exactly how many deals they're making. But I've been looking at the space pretty quickly for the first week that it's been out there. And this is definitely the biggest single number that I've seen to come from a company at this point. Yeah, so it's a mixed martial arts business in South Florida.

I'm assuming it's in South Florida, and they're going to try and pay roughly 90 players on Miami's football team a monthly payment of 500 bucks to advertise these gyms and this business. You know, in thinking about this, I am ultimately going to be fascinated as to whether or not investments like this pencil out with a lot of players that fans don't even know, even the hardcore, you know, you know, fans of a specific team. That's a huge investment for a business like that. It's totally acceptable on Miami's part, correct? Yes, they're on board, and it's important to know a couple things, right? First, they're getting a little bit more publicity by jumping out and making this splashy deal, and they may get some return on investment just from the fact that people like you and me are talking about this company right now.

And it's a pretty big-name Jim. And they have some major UFC fighters that train out of it that have won professional titles and that type of thing. But the other piece here is after talking to the owner yesterday, I don't know that he's all that concerned about making sure he gets every dollar of value back out of it. He's a huge Miami football fan and has been looking for legal ways to try to support players on that team for a long time. And this is as much him trying to boost the University of Miami football team as it is him trying to boost the profile of his own gyms and company. Yes, so this is where I eventually want to get to because how all of this manifests itself and creates potential furthering divide competitively is, I think, what a lot of people have concerns about. But I'm just curious, and I don't know if you know the answers to this, but will in situations like this, Will the players just be set up as 1099 independent contractors, and then they'll be responsible for paying taxes?

Does anybody have any idea how that works, and who manages it on behalf of young people that may not have a clue that all 500 bucks isn't theirs? Some of it's going back to the government, and not that state, at least the government. Right, right. So, yes, in these cases, it will be 1099. these players are essentially their own business, much like a lot of other sort of social media influencers or other people that make money off of their fame at this point. And most of the big schools, at least, a school like Miami certainly, has programs, have put programs in place even in the past few weeks to try to educate their athletes on all of this means, all of what this

means for them financially, both in terms of what boxes do you have to check in order to make sure you're following laws of all this money. What might this mean for some of the Pell grants that a lot of athletes are on based on their family income that gets reported when they sign up? Or even things like how to invest this and make smart decisions with your money and your brand. That's something that schools have invested a lot in and have tried to pay a lot of attention to because it's going to be part of the sales pitch in recruiting moving forward.

Not only are we going to help you strike these big deals, we're also going to make sure that you understand how to do it and how to take care of the money you might make while you're in school. Who are the leaders right now out there working with schools to manage this? Do you know who they are? There's a whole really cottage industry that has popped up in the past year or so that have started signing up with schools. There's some companies that have signed with dozens of schools. A couple you'll always hear about a company called Open Doors, one called Influencer.

There are some other companies that are more focused on working directly with the schools in the education part of this. But yeah, I would say right now there are dozens of folks that have jumped in. Some have experience in marketing. Some have experience in college athletics. A lot of social media people involved there too. But there's no shortage of options

to try to seek this help. And then for the biggest athletes, of course, there are the more traditional routes of big agencies that will be signing some of these guys to help them with the deals as well. Dan Murphy is joining us at Dan Murphy, ESPN, on Twitter. So I want to walk this back a little bit to the basics because I know a lot of people listening are familiar with name image likeness NIL.

I don't think they're intimately familiar with the details. So what will players be able to accept? Is this a state-by-state thing? Give me just the 30 to 60-second macro on NIL. and it can be very confusing at times, so it's worth trying to simplify it a little bit. The name image of like this is a right that everybody has, but for most of the existence of college sports, players have agreed to forfeit that right or not make money off of their popularity when they sign up for a scholarship. Those rules are now gone.

It does matter where you go to school. There are about a dozen states that have forced the NCAA to get rid of those rules by enacting state laws that went into effect in July, then they'd get illegal to take those rights away from a college athlete. The NCAA responded by saying, well, if some states are going to do this, we have to let everybody do it. But there are no real blanket restrictions on how this is going to play out.

So in some states, they have certain things that athletes are allowed to do and aren't allowed to do. And in states that don't have laws, it's up to the individual schools to set some kind of policy for what exactly will be allowed. But generally speaking, college athletes, can now make money from social media endorsements, from more traditional ad campaigns, from putting their name on a camp or lessons for youth athletes, from signing autographs,

from starting their own businesses. There's any number of sort of endless creative ways that athletes might be able to take advantage of this to try to cash in. So they can do commercials for products, right? Television commercials, any kind of commercial campaign for a product? Yeah, that's right. And we've seen, you know, I think we'll see a lot more of this play out in the social media world where athletes might have, you know, anywhere from a few thousand to some of them at the top that have millions of followers on their Instagram or TikTok accounts. And a lot of this will be endorsing products there. But for some of the biggest names in sports, we will probably also see them partner with big brands and start showing up on TV commercials or somewhere else like that.

You already mentioned, as we were talking about the Miami thing, that this guy is a big Miami football fan, a booster. Will there be any restrictions as it relates to boosters of a program if they own a business? Is there anything there that says the athlete can't do business with someone who's a big program supporter? So one of the things that's made this change really hard to follow for athletes, for fans, and for the college athletic department employees themselves is there's a ton of gray area in the rules, and they were left intentionally vague by the NCAA and some of the state laws. So there are some state laws that address boosters. Generally speaking, I've talked to a handful of attorneys about this.

There is no specific restrictions in the way that would keep a booster from, getting involved in supporting an athlete, as long as he's doing it through a company that is giving that money to an athlete in exchange for some type of service or some type of return. They start paying them a salary. There has to be a quid pro quo involved in it. So obviously, like for people that are new to the conversation, I want to make this clear and refute this if I'm wrong. But schools are not paying athletes, people.

They're not paying athletes directly. Players aren't getting paid to play. They're using their name, image, and likeness, and now they're able to generate revenue off of that outside of the school. Now, with that said, you said that schools are bringing in companies to help their athletes with this. what if they don't bring in outside companies to help with this? Are they allowed to arrange? By the way, this all circles back to recruiting advantages, ultimately, for a college sports fan like me.

Who's going to end up with an even bigger recruiting advantage and who's going to be at a bigger disadvantage than before? Can schools essentially set up or arrange these opportunities for the athletes? mostly no and again is this is one of these situations where it's hard to pin down an exact answer because there are different nuances in the way these laws are written in the way that individual schools will interpret some of the policy guidelines the NCAA has provided generally schools aren't allowed to specifically go out and talk to somebody in their local community you know go to the pizza shop down the street from campus and say hey I want you to sponsor six of my athletes here here's how I want you to do it. However, many of these schools are providing tools,

mostly in the form of like an online platform that an athlete can go on and that a local brand can go on. And it's almost like a dating app in some sense where they connect them. So there are a lot of things out, a lot of services out there like that that are thriving at the moment or popping up as part of that industry we talked about earlier. In general, the school can't directly be involved in facilitating these deals. But as we're seeing already, both with some of these big deals, some of the small things that are popping up, and certainly what this man, Dan Lambert down in Miami is doing, there are some pretty large loopholes that people are going to very quickly find, and this will absolutely, as much as the NCAA wanted to make sure this wouldn't have a big

impact on recruiting and what all this looks like, it is inevitable that this will in some way come back to fighting for an advantage in recruiting. This is truly, as I'm listening to you speak, this is truly the Wild Wild West. I mean, this is uncharted ground, and it's going to be really interesting to see how it plays out. You know, I would assume, tell me if I'm wrong, that a player, because you said if the school isn't using a company or if a bigger name player decides to seek out some of the, these opportunities with, say, a marketing agent on his or her own. They can't hire an agent agent. Can they? I'm assuming that they can or they would lose eligibility, but I'll let you

answer that question. And then how do you sort of figure out which is which at some point? So they can hire agents, you know, Scott Boris or Drew Rosenhaus or any of those big names you hear of unfortunately are allowed to sign college athletes. The distinction there is that the contract between an athlete and an agent has to be a college athlete and an agent has to be only for helping them procure endorsement deals. It can't also stipulate that if and when that athlete turns pro, the agent is also going to represent them in their salary negotiations or thing like that. Again, this is the kind of thing where they're trying to put up these walls, but it's really impossible to stop those relationships from forming.

Because, of course, if you sign with an agent in college, there's nothing to stop a wink and nod saying, hey, sign with me now, and I'll also help you out once you turn to pro, and we have an established relationship together. So this all comes back to trying to put rules in place to prevent the inevitable things of recruiting, getting involved, and this becoming. closer and closer to a professional operation, when really when you've cracked that door open, there's no way to make this a halfway there kind of deal, right? Just like you can't be half-pregnant, you can't half-step into the name image and likeness space and expect it not

to lead to some further degree of professionalization in college sports. Yeah, I don't see Drew Rosenhaus, you know, setting up a marketing slash advertising agent player relationships. and then not talking to his client about where he could potentially get drafted and handling his contract for him, negotiation. Right. It's impractical to think that those conversations won't take place, but I guess on some level, it's sort of impractical to think that they haven't taken place already. That's a great point. Yeah, a lot of this is bringing it closer above board.

That doesn't mean there won't still be handshake deals and other conversations that aren't there. But, yeah, if we're being honest, those have been happening for a long time, and now this provides a little bit more above board legal structure for those things to happen, and athletes to start cashing in now, rather than getting the proverbial envelope of cash while they're in school that has become such a, you know, ubiquitous thing in a lot of places in college sports.

I'm bouncing around here a little bit, and I wish I had thought about some of this stuff before we started, but that's okay. I'm just going to go with it. What can and can't an athlete make money doing? What about gambling money? Yeah, it's a good question, and it's the only way to approach this is bouncing around to different hypotheticals

because there's no clear path through all this right now. But, again, it kind of depends on where they are. There are certain state laws that expressly prohibit college athletes in those states from agreeing to endorse products like tobacco or alcohol or gambling or old entertainment or things like that. There are states where those laws don't exist, and there is no specific restriction to it. And that's, again, part of the messiness of all of this

is that athletes are going to have to sort through all that, and one of the concerns people have is that eventually athletes will be picking their school based on the opportunities they have to promote which businesses who has the most permissive rules. And certainly if schools have an option to be permissive or restrictive when it comes to recruiting, they're going to try to allow as much as they possibly can.

And eventually, we may get to a place where there is a national rule to try to create a little bit more order out of all of this in the college sports world. But right now, that doesn't exist. Well, I'm also thinking beyond just legalized gambling, what about things like alcohol? What about pornography? What about some of these opportunities? Is the answer the same?

It sort of comes down to state. and the rules set up for those particular states, which, by the way, I've got to get to next. But go ahead and answer that. Sorry. Yes, that's right. Generally, all of these things are on a state-by-state in some cases a school-by-school basis. I think largely you will see most schools in states say we don't want our athletes getting involved in that because not only are they representing themselves, but they're also representing the brand of,

the school that they're associated with. So I think schools will feel a little bit more comfortable telling their athletes, hey, if you want to try to associate yourself with a porn site or a strip club or some type of alcohol, you can't do that here. We don't want you here. Feel free to find some of the school to do that, but that's not good business for us. Boy, there's a whole, God, there's a whole education for the athlete, too, because ultimately the biggest money they'll make if they are professionally capable

will be contractually as a professional athlete. And a lot of the decisions they make as 18, 19, 20-year-olds will impact the way a future employer may view that person in a way that they could have never. They're going to know, they're going to know more about an 18 or a 19-year-old that they're thinking about drafting than ever before. By the way, Dan, from just the standpoint of, okay, what kind of person were they with some money, with some income?

Right. And I think that's why the education piece of this has been so important for the athletic department to try to wrap their head around. Some of these state laws even have requirements that schools provide some sort of financial literacy training to their athletes as part of the new. law opening these doors. And so I think you'll see a ton of schools pouring a lot of resources in doing their best to tell athletes how to handle this, both from an immediate, and we talk about

the tax implications, all that kind of thing right away, but also thinking long and hard about how they want to represent themselves publicly in the long term. And I think the folks that I've talked to who run those kind of businesses and have been doling out that kind of device have been telling athletes to tread very carefully and not get carried away with the money, but only to to seek out things that they're truly passionate about and truly believe in and think will reflect well on them in the long term and striking deals on those type of things and maybe passing up a few easy paychecks along the way well and not to mention the fact that you know how many get sort of consumed with personal brand we've already seen a lot of that anyway without the revenue

attached to it versus becoming better at their sport becoming better as a teammate all of that I think there's going to be just a lot more information on these players and the personality and the psychology of these players than ever before for pro teams. Back to the state thing for a moment. Because ultimately, like big picture, this is the way I'm sort of, and maybe I'm coming to sort of the wrong conclusion here. But I'm just thinking about this as a college sports fan. Ultimately, it's going to be, okay, if you come here, we can offer you this kind of an opportunity from, and income standpoint. And they're going to start comparing, not just schools and coaches and playing

opportunity, but revenue opportunity, right? I mean, that's sort of how ultimately big picture, it's going to create, there's going to be a huge recruiting advantage created by the opportunity to generate income for the athletes, and they're going to sell the hell out of that in the recruiting process. If they're not already selling it, they're certainly behind. that's been happening for about a year now. And that's why a lot of these companies are signing up with schools in selling the idea that, hey, we can help your athletes build their social media presence

and their brand and help get them out there a little bit better so that when the next round of recruits come through, you can sit them down and say, hey, here's what Athlete A came in with in terms of social media following and market value. And we put them through our education system and gave them the tools that we can offer. and here's where he ended up. This is the kind of earning potential we can help provide to you. And that's absolutely going to become a part of the recruiting pitches in the future if it hasn't already been in the past several months of this stuff has come to life.

Just as an aside, because I actually want to get to the state thing and find out which states have an advantage in terms of the Power 5 conferences and which don't. But one of the things that when I've had this conversation, as all of us in sort of sports content have had over the years about are you in favor of paying college athletes yes or no one of the things that i've always made the point um that i don't think the nc w a's been very good at is explaining and actually quantifying what the marketing platform is worth for a player and i there's a couple of examples dan that i always use in virginia won the national championship in college basketball back in 2019, and Ty Jerome was their starting point guard. And prior to that year, Ty Jerome was not a

projected first round pick. Ty Jerome was, you know, well known if you were a UVA fan or an ACC basketball fan, but going through that March, you know, in the month of March to a national championship, raised his profile significantly, which landed him in the first round, which meant an incremental whatever amount of money in contract number one, and additional endorsement opportunities that he would have never seen. I think college sports, people get wrapped up in room board tuition and all of that stuff, but the real unknown, non-quantified number is what college sports provides as a marketing platform versus going to the G League or versus playing internationally.

What is the difference in year one contract value, year one endorse? potential. I don't know if that's something that you've given a lot of thought and have had a lot of conversations, but I think the NCAA has always been poorer in communicating what that means to a player. Now, beyond that, there is actual immediate revenue generating opportunity. Sure. If you are the sixth man at Duke, you probably have more visibility than somebody who's that as a smaller, you know, conference USA school or something like that. And I think that's the nature of most professional, you could say the same about most professional sports, too, though, right?

If you happen to play on the Yankees or a team that's on an H.L. Family Cup run or whatever it may be, you're going to be able to benefit from that. That has stopped professional athletes in the past from casting in on that. So it's, you know, a rising tide lifts all boats kind of argument there, right, where the athlete is certainly benefiting from playing for a big brand school or a school that's successful, but that school is also benefiting from the fact that Ty Jerome is a really good basketball and has raised the profile of Virginia basketball in a lot of people's time. No doubt, but players in college sports, it's such a fleeting thing, whereas the brand, you know,

well, we saw it recently with, you know, Coach Kay's announcement of, you know, this being the upcoming final year. He's the brand much more than any player that's ever played for him. Obviously, he couldn't have accomplished what he accomplished without the great players. But I think when college sports fans, I think part of the attachment are coaches and traditions and programs not necessarily players because they're there for such a short period of time. Anyway, that's a separate conversation. I just don't think the NCAA has ever, you know, I think a lot of these academics have been very poor. Emert, et cetera, have been very poor in communicating the overall financial benefit to being an unpaid college player. I think they focus on things like room board tuition, and if you're an out-of-state student, it can be worth, you know, that's like a half million to, you know, in value in coaching and coaching and

training and food and all that. But the real upside is the marketing platform that exists. But I wanted to go back to the states. So right now, you said it, correct me if I'm wrong, you said earlier, some states have already sort of passed laws and others haven't. Right now for the Power 5 conferences, are there schools in states that have a major advantage over other schools in states that haven't pass laws or haven't had laws go into effect yet? So there's a little bit of a tricky question because, so there are about a dozen states that have laws in effect. And in some cases, those laws allow for more types of deals than what the NCAA is allowing

for. In some cases, they're more restrictive, right? Some of these states have laws in place where you have to let your school know seven days or 14 days in advance of signing a deal, what's going to happen in the school has to approve of it. In the viral marketing world, seven and 14 days, the cycle can spin over five or six times, right? If you're a star quarterback who has this play that goes viral for a few days,

you might have a whole bunch of people that want to team up with you, a lot of brands that want to team up with you and pay with you, pay for your attention that you have for the next few days, but that will go away quickly. So in some cases, that's more restrictive than what the NCAA has laid out. All of this is still very much in flux, and I think eventually we will land at a place for either Congress or maybe just the NCAA itself creates one sort of national rule, and I would imagine that wouldn't take more than a few months or perhaps a year to get there.

So I don't know that ultimately these differences and laws and different policies is going to play a huge long-term effect, and we haven't yet seen that play out, whether it's through transfers going to a certain place or recruits signing with a certain place because of the laws they have in place. I think it will come down to more individual schools, and the way they pitch this is how they're going to help each of their athletes try to make the most of whatever opportunities they have. Have you thought about or projected what, like, the best case upside income could be for the biggest name or the bigger name college football or college basketball players,

like what is really in it for them? How much could they make in a given year? So there's two categories really that hit the top tier of potential earnings. There are the folks that are going to be national stars. Think of Tim Tebow or Zion Williamson or whoever might be coming down the pike next in that vein. And according to the people that I've talked to to track these kind of things, Those guys are looking at certainly six figures, high six figures, if not low seven figures in a year of what they could potentially make if they want to really invest the time to try to make the most out of it. The other group that could get a very high return are, well, let's hit two real quick, right, to throw into that group of college superstars, there's the Olympic superstars, right?

People like Katie Ledecki or Missy Franklin or even Simone Biles if he had wanted to go to college if these rules were in place. those folks are in line for seven-figure-type endorsements in an Olympic year and could still retain their college eligibility, which is something that they were never able to do before. The last group they could cash in, and we're talking about the six-figure range, is folks that aren't necessarily superstars in sports, but have skills beyond that and have built audiences,

especially in the social media world. There's a pair of twins who are president-based basketball players. Yeah, the Cavender twins. They will make at least six figures if they have. haven't already because they have huge followings from people on social media just for being personalities in the way that social media has created a bunch of sort of super stars. For being super attractive, even though they're at Fresno State as college basketball players, sort of off the grid to a certain degree. But I was going to ask you about that. That's

interesting. So go ahead. Continue on that. Yeah, so there's stars like that, people that have generated an audience. And there is an art and a skill to generate. that big of an audience, they will again have an opportunity to, I think, to make the six figures and on a yearly basis while they're in school. The star athletes, the Olympic athletes, and those that aren't necessarily household names and would never have been other than the fact that they have a massive social media following. It's funny because the Cavender Twins at Fresno State were sort of the big first story out of this right last week.

And one of the things I thought about is I just said, you know what? I didn't even think about it from that standpoint, but, you know, look, we live in a world of attractive people getting massive opportunities, and I think this is going to be a huge opportunity for

female athletes. Do you agree or disagree? I do. I do. I think one of the big myths of people who were trying to shoot this down as it came up was that this was going to really hurt female sports some of the smaller sports that don't generate the same TV money that football and basketball do. And I think for a couple reasons, there are opportunities out there for these athletes promote themselves in a way that their school or the NCAA has never promoted their sport before

and find those mid-audiences and generate some more attention on top of the idea that they can find other ways to generate money themselves. will this help keep schools and athletic programs specifically in the two high-profile revenue generating sports of college football and college basketball. Will it help these schools and coaches keep these players in school longer? I think that's certainly a possibility. Right now, all of this stuff is so new that it's hard to say definitively one way or the other, what the outcome is going to be.

It's still formulating. The marketplace itself is still formulating. But we have seen examples of already where a couple NBA-type bubble-type draft folks, Hunter Dickinson at Michigan is one of the players. I'm thinking of had a great freshman year for the Wolverines, announced yesterday that he was going to come back for another season instead of testing the draft where he would have been sort of a borderline-type draft pick. And he said that the ability to make a little bit of money while he's playing one more

season in college football through name image and like this field was a factor in his decision to come back. Yeah, unfortunately, as a Maryland alum and big Maryland basketball fan, Aaron Wiggins, didn't think that the same opportunity applied to him. You know, last one, Dan, like four people that are just, they love sitting down on a Saturday in the fall, watching college football, they enjoy college basketball, especially during March. Is it going to change anything for them? Immediately, I don't really see a huge change. You may see some of these athletes in commercials,

breaks in between your games you're watching. I don't see that you'll feel an immediate impact, maybe five or ten years from now college sports looks different in some significant way than it does now through a whole bunch of different factors. But the immediate impact for me, from what I've seen in the first week or so of this happening, is you may actually learn a lot more about what your favorite players are

passionate about off the course or off the field because they'll be getting involved in these fields. And you'll also have more opportunities to interact with that. There's a company out there that's set up so athletes can make some money by logging on and playing a video game against a fan. And the fan pays, you know, $10 or 20 bucks or whatever it is to be able to spend some time with their athlete while they're relaxing. There may be, you know, opportunities for speaking, engagements that these athletes have that they didn't have before autograph signing, but

fans will actually have more of an opportunity to interact with their athletes, and it could end up being a good thing if you're a sports fan in the long run, based on the new incentives for athletes to take some time to do that. I don't think, I lied, I've got one more, I think. I don't think that, I think my gut feel is that the power programs, you know, thinking in college football, Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State, Texas. even if they aren't in high-profile densely populated markets where by the way the advertising opportunities may be more not only plentiful but you know the number of eyeballs that you're

reaching on a local state you know in a local situation might equate to a bigger income opportunity it seems to me though that the big schools with even in these smaller college towns that are so passionate or in these states where they're so passionate about Alabama being, you know, an example, that that's where the best opportunities will lie, not necessarily in New York at St. John's, because if you're a good player at St. John's on their basketball team, you could do a local deal that could be worth a lot more money. I'm just, I don't know where I'm going with this, but I'm just trying to think of who and which kind of schools and programs will benefit the most. Yeah, it's a good question.

And again, it's one of those things that I think is just too early to tell exactly how all this is going to play out who's going to be interested. But there's an argument to be made to say, hey, go to L.A. where there are more companies. You'll have an opportunity there, and there's an argument to say, go to Lincoln, Nebraska, where you are the biggest show in the whole state, and people are going to want to associate themselves with somebody who's on the Kornhuskers team. And honestly, the answer is probably there will be certain athletes in both of those situations who work out better for them.

It'll be, I think, a very much case-by-case thing because it's so broad, right? To try to describe this whole new marketplace as it's going to be this thing or it's going to be that is probably not fair to just the variety of athletes who can take advantage, the variety of deals, whether it's a six-figure endorsement deal or just getting a free slice of pizza once a week if you're a lower-profile athlete. This is going to impact a lot of different people in a lot of different ways. I think trying to sum it up as this is what it means for college sports is probably a fool there and at this point, and they always be.

Yeah, the whole thing is so interesting. And I do come back to sort of the advertiser. At the end of the day, the one that isn't the passionate booster that doesn't care about how much money it costs them to be a part of it, ultimately it's going to have to pay for itself. And that'll whittle down the number of, you know, for the lack of a better description, applicants. And there's a lot of learning there. Like how much product can these college athletes really move for a specific advertiser? Because eventually it'll come down to, you know, did it provide a return on investment or not? Except for the crazies that have always been there anyway

that are looking to just be a part of the program and make sure their program has the best chance to win and they don't care what they spend, like maybe this guy in South Florida. It's really interesting. Dan Murphy's written a lot, you know, and there's a lot of different stories that he's written on this. He's, you know, clearly the lead or one of the leads at ESPN uncovering NIL. It's going to play out and branch out into so many different things. And over the next few years, it'll certainly lead to more conversations about paying athletes directly or not. But it's fascinating territory, Dan.

Thanks so much for your time. I really appreciate it. Yeah, fun talking with you, Kevin. Thank you. Hey, Dan, that was awesome. It's crazy. Yeah. To be honest with you, I read your story this morning, and as I was reading it, I pulled up some of your other stories. It's really the Wild West out there. I mean, the Maryland program, I know pretty well, and I know Mark Turgeon pretty well, and I know they're really, you know, it's like every day, it's a different situation. Like it's a, and you almost, these cottage industry of companies that are that are going to university saying, let us handle it, they're going to make big money.

I mean, as long as they've got, you know, as long as they're getting a big cut of whatever it is. Oh, yeah, for sure. It's a pretty, I mean, you basically just created a brand new, you know, economy out of nowhere and they turn the switch on it overnight, yeah. Right. It'll be fun to see it unfold. Thank you.

I really appreciate it. Take care. Yep. See you later. All right. That was interesting to me. I hope it was to you, Dan Murphy from ESPN. If that seemed, by the way, at times a little bit disorganized or scattered, that's my fault. I just in listening to him was thinking of questions that I did not have written down before he started to talk. The whole thing is really hard to piece together and very hard to predict.

But it'll be interesting, and college sports are going to be a little bit different from certainly a recruiting standpoint. That's for sure. Thanks to Dan Murphy. Thanks to Steve Zabin, who joined us on the show, back tomorrow with Tommy.